018 - Galaxy 4

Broadcast:

11^th September - 2^nd October 1965

Doctor:

William Hartnell

Companions:

Vicki, Steven

Adversary:

Drahvin, Rill, Chumblies

Written by:

William Emms

Director:

Derek Martinus, Mervyn Pinfield

Music:

Stock

Script Editor:

Donald Tosh

Producer:

Verity Lambert

Average Viewers:

9.93m (9, 9.5, 11.3, 9.9)

Summary: Two stranded spaceships are at war but urgently need to escape a doomed planet. The Doctor's arrival gives both sides hope but can he help save everyone in time?

Galaxy 4 has an interesting place in the Doctor Who virtual archive. It is the earliest story to have just one episode remaining (but of course Marco Polo is missing completely and The Reign Of Terror has two of its four missing), it is the first story of the third season (but was produced within the second season's recording block) and Story Edited by Donald Tosh (but he was also credited on The Time Meddler although little work was required because it was written by the outgoing Story Editor), it is also the last serial to be produced by Verity Lambert (but the 'Dalek Cutaway' episode Mission To The Unknown was truly her last episode, acting as a teaser episode for The Daleks' Master Plan), and its viewing figures increased with each episode rather than gently dropping off (not the first story to achieve this but the first since The Daleks). The missing first episode has nearly 6 minutes in tact thanks to the excerpt being considered for inclusion in Whose Dr. Who in 1977 (only 30 seconds were actually used but the rest of the clip was rescued by a production advisor) making it the largest remaining clip from an otherwise missing episode! It also has the dubious honour of containing the Chumblies as quite comical but sincere creatures (actually, they are robots) that are both adorable and pathetic... which sums up my general feeling for the whole adventure!

In the six weeks that Doctor Who had been off air, both the Maldives and Singapore became independent; America stepped up aggression in Vietnam with their first major ground battle and fighting flared between Pakistan and India while China announced it would reinforce its troops on the Indian border but a week later protested against Indian provocations in the area! Three natural disasters took over 300 lives - 90 by a Swiss avalanche, 76 by Hurricane "Billion Dollar Betsy" in New Orleans (the last major hurricane there until Katrina 40 years later), and the majority by a volcano in the Philippines. A further 34 lives were lost during race riots in Los Angeles, while 66 former SS personnel received life sentences at the Auschwitz trial. In the UK, cigarette advertising was banned on TV (though pipe tobacco and cigars continued until 1991), Elizabeth Lane became the first female High Court judge and Peter Watkins's drama-documentary The War Game due to be broadcast as part of BBC1's 'The Wednesday Play' was pulled following government pressure, concerned about its traumatically honest portrayal of nuclear strike aftermath - It would go on to receive a cinematic release, earning it an Academy Award in 1966 and was finally broadcast in 1985 (presumably thanks to the previous year's TV movie Threads which was essentially the same idea)

In the cinemas were two 'intelligent chimp' movies Bikini Beach and The Monkey's Uncle as well as a number of war films and westerns while future Doctor Who companion Bernard Cribbins could be seen in You Must Be Joking (along with many other British greats) and of course Peter Cushing was the Doctor himself in Dr. Who And The Daleks. The Beatles performed the world's first stadium concert at Shea Stadium, met Elvis Presley and released their second film Help! accompanied by an album and single which spend three weeks at number one. Other songs topping the charts were "I Got You Babe" (Sonny & Cher), "(I Can't Get No) Satisfaction" (The Rolling Stones), "Make It Easy on Yourself" (The Walker Brothers) and Ken Dodd started an impressive five week run with "Tears". Meanwhile Bob Dylan shocked many fans by 'going electric' at the Newport Folk Festival.

Television also saw some classics born in the shape of "Tom & Jerry" and "Thunderbirds"... All this excitement and all Doctor Who had to offer its television viewers was the weak Galaxy 4. But let's take a closer look and understand why I say that...

My opinion may be slightly coloured by the fact that 3/4 of Galaxy 4 is still missing and I only had reconstructions to watch but the plot lets it down just as much. The official reconstruction presented on the Special Edition DVD of The Aztecs includes some reasonable animation along with surviving clips and still images but the first two episodes are condensed to just 28 minutes. The third episode is complete thanks to former ITV engineer Terry Burnett (who had bought it along with episode 2 of The Underwater Menace at a school fete in the 1980s), but episode 4 is again reduced to half its original length and the last minute sets things up for the next story (in the full length version it's nearer 2 minutes if you include a little tail-off TARDIS dialogue). Despite being butchered, the story still holds up and it wasn't until the third episode started that I realised the first two had been squeezed together. However, for this review I watched the Loose Canon reconstruction first (having previously seen the DVD edition when I bought it some time last year) and it did feel quite empty despite the first episode being a short 21 minutes (excluding titles and credits) - there is a whole section where Steven and the Doctor return to the TARDIS and then back to the Drahvin ship with the soul outcome being the discovery that they had far less time than first thought. It was very nearly a narrative loop that just served to pad out he episode, and maybe it was, but the same detail could have been added far more dramatically when the Doctor actually had to return to the TARDIS later in the story. In general if feels like a perfectly acceptable comic strip adventure but lacks the detail and character for a four part television serial.

One of the details lost in the official reconstruction in a lovely interaction between Vicki and Steven and she finishes cutting his hair! Clearly a bit of 'stuff' to help pad the episode but brief enough to be a surprise omission, especially when you consider the fact that the opening seconds exist as a telerecording and you see Vicki stood behind Steven doing something before the recording ends. It serves as an indicator of normal life finding its way into the hectic TARDIS chaos and is backed up by the Doctor's observation that the planet they have landed on looks perfectly habitable yet is lifeless so perhaps they will have a restful period for once... though Hartnell fumbled the line quite badly saying "I think we shall get some... long deserved [trailing off then starting the next word strongly] Undeserved peace... [pause as he seems to realise he's made it worse before soldiering on] for once." and sadly there are several others to follow as the serial progresses, saying 'chance' instead of 'choice' for example and at one point during the action of the final episode he seems to dry completely and following a rescue prompt from Peter Purves goes on to fumble his way through his next line (which, ironically , is also about having a rest) - Out of the blue Steven says "You want me to stay here?" leading the Doctor to his line "You stay here with the leader of the Rill and try and have some rest... get some... self [or 'help'] contain yourself" and shortly after tells the Rill "We near... we don't need space"

There are some interesting ideas presented within Galaxy 4 but they are loosely held together by the narrative. The planet the TARDIS lands on is perfect for life yet the only life present is there by accident and is trying to leave; The Chumblies (named by Vicki because "they have a sort of... chumbly movement") appear to be cute, have a terrible blind-spot yet seem set on destroying the TARDIS or forcing entry, and are later revealed to be service robots; the Drahvin are a society dominated by women with the bulk of their population cultivated to fight and kill but with little understanding of anything else, and very few men because they serve little purpose and are a drain on resources; the Drahvin present themselves as the victims and don't trust anything the Rill say, reinforcing the Doctor's misconception that the Chumblies are a threat; the Rill are an 'ugly' non humanoid species who require an atmosphere which is ammonia rich but despite the Drahvin propaganda are actually the nice guys and have been trying to offer them help. Ultimately then, all preconceptions are turned on their heads and the Doctor helps the Rill charge up their ship so they can escape but the Drahvin's stubbornness and inflexibility lead them to be left to die with practically no remorse or concern from the regulars.

There are also little details like the three suns (which reminds the Doctor of Xeron which in turn prompts vicki to ask if they might have jumped a time track again - both references to The Space Museum; the Doctor tests the metal of both Drahvin and Rill ships with a screwdriver (at least, according to the Loose Canon reconstruction, because there is no specific close up reference in the official one); the Chumblies are unable to damage the TARDIS due to the Doctor's 'Force Barrier'; and there is a reminder that the Doctor never kills anything and neither do his friends... yet he sabotages the Rill's air supply before he knows they are friendly and of course makes no attempt to help the Drahvin at the end! It's also nice to see a power cable coming from the TARDIS for the first time as well as seeing the star map for a second time. Oh and watch out for the Sensorite stools again!

As the TARDIS departs, the Doctor explains that they won't see the planet explode because they are already in another place entirely. In a bizarre and unnecessary moment we learn that Vicki has hurt her ankle, presumably in the final escape run to the TARDIS and while the Doctor recommends a wet cloth to sooth it Vicki observes the scanner screen "Look at that planet! I wonder what's going on there..." at which point the camera zooms in on it and all focus is away from the TARDIS for thirteen days as the next episode will be completely without the regular cast...

To summarise, I like the Chumblies and I like what Galaxy 4 tries to do but it is clearly an end of budget production and I will be interested to see how Mission To The Unknown plays out as an extra episode added because of the reduction of Planet Of Giants from four to three episodes at the start of the series. The sets are quite reasonable, though limited (there are essentially just three sets, one for each ship and one for the planet surface), the costumes are sound especially the Rill (from what is discernible from the reconstructions) and even the stock music works well. However, the plot is flimsy with a lot of dialogue and little consequence and the over all score is also dragged down by lack of both humour and fear. There is intrigue but not enough to capture the imagination and the only real enemy to speak of is frustration at the Drahvin, though the airlock cliffhanger at the end of episode three is quite a dramatic one. Having said that it is frustrating for the viewer to know that Steven didn't need to lock himself in in the first place. What saves Galaxy 4 is the Chumblies and the production staff's shear determination to make the most of a bad situation and the fact that the episodes are mostly filled with some form of quality padding rather than meaningless drivel or slow scenes of silent wondering between ships. As a result, I gave it a score of just 58% bringing it close to the bottom of the list with only The Space Museum scoring lower due to its poorer production scores.

What follows for me now is four more missing or partially missing stories with just 3 of the next 21 episodes in existence...